Cross Currents: Composer Michael Gallen

Michael Gallen is an Irish composer and performer. Having been brought up primarily with Irish traditional and folk music, he later pursued studies in composition with Jose Manuel Lopez Lopez in Paris, and is comfortable meandering at the borders of different musical styles. He has been commissioned to write for solo instrument, small ensemble and orchestra, and is fast developing a reputation as one of Ireland’s most exciting composers of new choral music.

Michael features in Episode 3 of #CrossCurrents which airs Friday September 23rd at 7pm RTÉ Lyric FM - http://www.crosscurrents.ie/episode-3/

In 2011 his piece The Hidden/The Dead was winner of the Densité 93/Cervantes prize. Since his return to more familiar shores, Michael has been involved in several collaborations with dance and theatre, and has an operatic work in the pipeline and he has recently finished the orchestral and choral work Wilde Stories, a suite of music performed and recorded by RTE Concert Orchestra and broadcast on RTE lyric fm as part of its Wilde Stories project with Athena Media.

He regularly collaborates with choreographer Philip Connaughton, and a piece entitled TARDIGRADE, for choir, piano, string quartet and a kaleidoscope of dance and video premiered at the 2014 Dublin Fringe Festival to critical acclaim, winning the prize for best sound, visual and costume design.

His music has been used extensively in film, radio and television, including the score for Athena Media/RTE Radio 1’s Citizens:Lockout 1913-2013 series which won Gold Medal at the 2014 New York Radio Festival Awards and for the Kinder Letters which won the Grand /Gold award in New York Radio Festival 2016 , winning history documentary for Athena Media/Newstalk. The Kinder Letters is now nominated for a PPI Award 2016 for best documentary. Michael is also the pianist and lead vocalist with touring Irish band Ana Gog and a founding member of the DeySed art collective. Michael is currently working on an opera called 'A Month in the Lock'.

Music used in this short feature:

• A Hidden Delight - Child Chorale 2 Rubato - Wilde Stories - instrumental for radio series
• Tardigrade - dance commission
• Press Closer - Sinai - Wilde Stories instrumental piece for radio series
• The Rite of Spring - Stravinsky
• How to go off ( like a rocket ) - Wilde Stories
• Press Closer - Wilde Stories www.wildestories.ie